The long-term objective of this proposal is to develop a practical method for inactivating the viruses that contaminate blood for transfusion. Over 30 million units of red blood cells are transfused annually worldwide, representing an estimated market of over 3 billion dollars. An effective virus decontamination procedure would address an enormous unmet need and represent a significant market opportunity. We obtained preliminary results in the presence of red blood cells that demonstrated robust killing of a number of different enveloped and non-enveloped viruses, including model viruses for human Bl9 parvovirus and hepatitis C virus. This killing was achieved using a novel class of viral inactivating agents, INACTINE (TM) compounds, which are highly selective for nucleic acids over proteins or other biomolecules. we propose to further study and optimize the virus killing in the presence of red blood cells. Then we will study the effect of INACTINE(TM) treatment on red blood cell physiology under these optimized conditions. These results will set the stage for an expanded program to develop an effective method for treating red blood cells in a blood bank setting. PROPOSED COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS: Although the US blood supply is considered quite safe as a result of extensive donor screening and testing, there is a still great need for safe, effective virus inactivation procedure(s). New blood-borne viruses are being discovered and the risk of infection from known viruses is l in 34,000 units of blood. Therefore, there is a large market opportunity for the INACTINE(TM) virus inactivation technology in the blood banking industry.